Multi-sensor surveillance with in-situ environmental characterization

It has been speculated that the performance of surveillance systems can be enhanced by the capability to sense and adapt to the environment in which it is deployed. Moreover, the use of multiple sensors, which observe the same surroundings using different physics, should provide more information and greater accuracy in characterizing an operational environment. However, it is not often easy or straightforward to predict the accuracy or validity of environmentally derived data from inverse methods, even when using a single sensor type. This presentation describes a methodology for predicting the parameter estimation errors achieved by a hypothetical system comprising an acoustic and an electromagnetic (EM) sensor. The hypothesis is tested by investigating a shallow water environment with mostly known parameters